Page 12 - AHATA

Tuesday 12 March 2024 LOCAL
A10

Aruba to me

ORANJESTAD — You are back and we would Last but not least: check out our website, Insta-
like to portrait you! By inviting you to send us gram and Facebook page! Thank you for sup-
your favorite vacation picture while enjoying porting our free newspaper, we strive to make
our Happy Island. you a happy reader every day again.
For today we received a lovely message from
Complete the sentence: Aruba to me is ……. our awesome visitors Susan & Bill Werner
Send your picture with that text (including your Seabrook, NH, USA.
name and where you are from) to: news@aru-
batoday.com and we will publish your vaca- They wrote to us saying: “Aruba to us is our sec-
tion memory. Isn’t that a special way to keep ond home! We first visited this beautiful island
your best moments alive? Please do note: By paradise on our honeymoon in 1982, and now
submitting photos, text or any other materials, we are so fortunate to own a condo on Eagle
you give permission to The Aruba Today News- Beach.”
paper, Caribbean Speed Printers and any of
its affiliated companies to use said materials, Thank you for sending us this wonderful mes-
as well as names, likeness, etc. for promotional sage sharing what Aruba means to you with us
purposes without compensation. and our readers!q

Alto Vista chapel and its link to Aruba’s origins

According to Etnia Nativa, of the Spanish crown and
in the 18th century most of Rome. In 1752 the prosecu-
the inhabitants of Aruba tion passed into the hands
were indigenous who lived of Antonio Silvester’s son-
on the north coast, one of in-law, Miguel Álvarez, who
the largest communities continued to guide the pa-
lived in Alto Vista. rishioners in their prayers.

As they were very religious, According to the book,
they had a chief with the The History of Alto Vista by
name of Antonio Silvester R.H. Nooyen, it is not known
who guided them in the when Domingo Antonio Sil-
Christian life and it was he vester came to Aruba from
who decided to build a Venezuela. The elders be-
stone chapel with a roof lieve Antonio was a Span-
of corn rods, which would iard. In 1780, father Joseph
serve as a place of prayer. Antonio de la Vegal called
In 1750 it was blessed by Fa- Bernardino Silvester, one of
ther Algamesi who came Antonio’s sons with his wife
from Coro-Venezuela and Anna Cathalina Tromp,
appointed Domingo Anto- “neighbors and naturals of
nio Silvester as the island’s the island Aruba” and thus
first prosecutor in the name they became natives.
Church of the Queen of there are still the markings
At the end of the eighteen the Holiest Rosary to build of an old house, where
century many inhabitants a new chapel on the same Antonio and Bernardino
the island died as a result of place. The entire surround- Silvester would have lived.
the black fever epidemic ing area was empty and About 200 meters from the
and since people believed desolated, making it hard chapel there is a water
that the Alto Vista area was to imagine that Alto Vista tank which the locals call
the most infected, they be- was a town at all. A hun- Tanki Cacique. In the past
gan to build their homes dred years later, people this tank was closed. But
further south within the can see the remains of mostly water was brought
Noord area, so the town of around twenty houses, out from the Poz di Noord,
Noord began to grow into some made of stone and a well dug in the sand.
a community till getting its others of clay. Nowadays,
own Church. However re- only around six of these The chapel can be viewed
ligious festivals continued houses remain. from basically any point in
to be celebrated at this sa- the north side, even from
cred native place, with the South of the chapel in the Paradera and Sero Plat.
custom of arriving in pro- yard two graves can be All the historical remains
cession to Alto Vista. observed, there was the around the chapel provide
cemetery which father us with an idea on how the
Two-hundred years after Pablo de Algemesi blessed. old people of Alto Vista
the beautiful time of Alto It is not certain, but it is be- used to live. Don’t miss the
Vista, people can no lon- lieved that the two graves opportunity to visit a place
ger see much of the town belong to Antonio Silvester of historical significance
of Alto Vista from 1750. With and Miguel Alvares, ac- with a window to Aruba’s
a lot of work they found cording to Nooyen. About past.q
the old foundations of the 50 meters near the chapel